Bruce Millar

Bruce Millar (1945-2023) actor, singer and producer.

Biography

Born in Bulawayo on 17 December, 1945, he trained in Bristol, England, graduating with a B.A. Joint Honours Drama and English and then spent two years at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School.

He passed away om Johannesburg on 16 November, 2023.

Contribution to SA theatre, film, media and/or performance

He was first seen in South Africa as the blind boy in Butterflies are Free.

He also performed in The Boy Friend, Abelard and Heloise, White Liars, Lovers, A Macbeth, Best of Birds and Beasts, Godspell (as “Jesus”, for which he won a Gallo award for Best musical performance 1974), Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (as “Joseph” for which he was nominated for a Gallo Award), and Henry IV (as Prince Hal)

He starred in an adaptation of Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris directed by Taubie Kushlick and staged between 1975 and 1983. He starred in Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice’s Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat for PACT at the Alexander Theatre in 1974, Grease(1977), The Bed (1980), I’m Getting My Act Together and Taking It On the Road (1980), Lennon (1981).

Since then has been seen in a wide variety of productions from Robert Kirby revues (eg. Separate Development, which went to the Manchester Royal Exchange Theatre) to Michael McCabe's production of Everyman for which Bruce wrote and sang a couple of pseudo-Gregorian songs).

He is probably best know for his performances in musicals, beginning with the original Des and Dawn Lindberg production of Godspell in which he played Jesus. He the played the title role in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat earning a Gallo Award nomination.

Other musicals include Grease, Lennon and Fangs. In 1976 Bruce's recording of I Won't Give Up topped the Hit Parade for six weeks earning him a Gold Record.

When SABC started its television service in January 1976 he sang on the opening night variety show ('thus becoming one of the first artists in the country to be switched off...'). Since then his TV appearances have included The Danny Bickett Show, Along Came A Spider and he was the presenter of Follow That Star.

Film roles included Safari 3000

Bruce is also a familiar voice to the dying breed of radio listeners, having played Al Capone in Mr Scarface and Pip in Great Expectations.

Awards, etc.

He received an Actor of the Year nomination for Butterflies are Free.

He won the Gallo Award for Best Performance in a Musical for Godspell in which he played Jesus.

In 1976 he won two SARI awards - 'Best Male Vocalist' and 'Top Twenty Artist of the Year'.

Sources

Tucker, 1997.

SACD 1973; 1974; 1975/76; 1977/78; 1978/79; 1979/80; 1981/82.

Programme of Pieter Toerien's Isn't It Romantic in 1985.

"Sanger en akteur Bruce Millar sterf", Die Burger, 18 November, 2023: Aktueel p. 3.

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0588006/bio.

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